


hard and full of liars

by thedevilchicken



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, First Time, M/M, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-01
Updated: 2020-08-01
Packaged: 2021-03-05 22:40:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25653004
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedevilchicken/pseuds/thedevilchicken
Summary: Davos stopped wondering what his soulmark said when he was young; he couldn't read it, and no good ever came from smallfolk knowing.Then, he smuggles food into Storm's End. Slowly, things begin to make sense.
Relationships: Stannis Baratheon/Davos Seaworth
Comments: 6
Kudos: 99
Collections: Rare Male Slash Exchange 2020





	hard and full of liars

**Author's Note:**

  * For [The_Plaid_Slytherin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Plaid_Slytherin/gifts).



Davos remembers how he sometimes used to wonder what his soulmark said, back when he was young but probably still old enough to know better. 

He remembers looking out to sea from the bow of the ship as he recalled all the old stories about gallant knights and beautiful maidens who'd find their soulmarks matched and then live happy lives with one another, except he knew reality was harsher. More girls lost their virtues to dashing knights who claimed to wear their names than those who rode off to be the mistress of some highborn lord's great castle, that was for certain. And, what was more, Davos couldn't read his mark himself any more than those poor naive girls could; no one he knew could read it, either, or at least no one could who he trusted to tell him the truth. Men lie. He's always known that. 

So, in time, the intrigue faded. In time, he could almost forget it was there, on the inside of his left wrist, lines and swirls in the same muted blue as the veins that lay underneath. He's worn a leather cuff over it since his youth, since he'd made enough coin to replace the scrap of fabric that he'd tied there like a bandage to cover it up. He hadn't wanted anyone on the Cobblecat, or any ship he'd sailed in after, to know it was there or try to read it. Smallfolk had no time for soulmates, after all - ferreting them out was a pastime for them that had the time to pass. 

And then, in the course of time, he met Stannis Baratheon. 

Davos had never felt that he needed a lord. In Flea Bottom, the closest you met that came near to a lord was men who wanted something. On a ship, on the seas, the captain was your lord, and there was no need he be born high for that. But when he sailed into Storm's End and found a man as close to starving as he'd ever seen and still have the strength to hold himself upright, things changed. 

In the start, he wasn't even sure he could put words to what that change was, just that he knew there was one. Some of the other men, even as they ate the food he'd brought, looked at him as if they had suspicions of his motive, and Davos had to admit he'd rarely had the strongest moral compass - he much preferred one that he could use at sea; he'd slipped in past the Redwyne fleet for money, after all, so their looks were only fair. Stannis, though, didn't give him that look. He gave him another look instead, far harder, face to face, not like the others, not behind their hands as they ate their fucking onions. 

"You're a smuggler," Stannis said. 

"I am," Davos replied. And though he'd never felt much pride in that, he'd also never felt much shame; at that moment, though, as Stannis held his gaze, he thought he might have felt a prickle of it. Or, perhaps, that was something else. 

"You've saved us," Stannis said. "You'll have a reward." 

He spoke straightforwardly, free of sentiment. There were no tears of gratitude in his eyes, no joy on his face, only an acknowledgement of the facts at hand, and Davos understood then that this man would have held Storm's End until his own end came, because it was his duty to. Davos had never known that kind of duty, not in all his years of sailing. One captain was very much like another, ready to sell you out if the price was right, and he supposed he might have done the same himself if pushed. And later, once they'd parted ways for a little while, when he thought back through their brief exchange, Davos felt that same strange prickle underneath his skin again. He felt it in his wrist, under his cuff, and rubbed there with a frown. He wondered if his soulmate, out there somewhere in the world, if they still lived, would be disappointed in him. 

When Stannis told him what he'd give and what he'd take from him, reward and penalty not strictly linked though others have always seemed to think so, Davos took off the cuff around his left wrist. Stannis' fingers brushed his soulmark and Davos shivered at it, deeply. Then Stannis turned his hand palm down and took the cleaver in his own. It was quick, at least. The edge was sharp. And while his missing fingers throbbed, through the treatment Stannis ordered, through the poppy-milk haze, it was his soulmark that he felt the most. It stung. He wasn't sure if that meant his soulmate would be pleased with him or if Ser Davos Seaworth of the Rainwood would be everything that they despised. Somehow, when Stannis visited, hard-eyed and tight-lipped, he wasn't sure that mattered. 

Years have passed since then. Years of prickling, and nagging thoughts on the edge of sleep, and a loyalty his lord had earned but he still couldn't understand. And, when he finally felt it was time, he sat down to learn to read. He kept the cuff over his wrist, though, because he didn't want to know the truth of what it was that he suspected, not until he knew enough to know for sure. 

Stannis doesn't much like tourneys, and Davos can't say he's enamoured of them, either; they're too much a chance for younger, vainer men to preen, and they've neither of them any time for that. King Robert demanded Stannis' attendance for his coronation, though, then the anniversary of it five years after. Davos went with him. And after the feast, when Stannis retired to his pavilion, Davos went there with him. Inside, once the flap fell back into place behind them, he took off his coat, and he rolled up his sleeves, and Stannis watched him from his chair. The fact he didn't ask what he was doing spoke volumes, Davos thought; they were volumes he'd be able to read now, were they written down, thanks to his lessons with Maester Pylos. 

Davos took the cuff from around his wrist, set it aside, and rubbed the mark there underneath. He turned his hand. He held it out to Stannis, the mark there above his four foreshortened fingers. 

"What does it say, my lord?" he asked, as he came to the table, hand outstretched. 

Stannis didn't look. He didn't have to look; he'd seen it before, years before, the day he'd taken Davos' fingers. He held Davos' gaze instead. 

"It says _Stannis Baratheon_ ," he replied. 

"You knew." 

"Yes." 

He wanted to ask why he hadn't told him then and there, except he wasn't sure if that was proper etiquette or not. So he just stood there with his hand still thrust out toward him, until Stannis pressed his hands to the arms of his chair and stood. He took off his doublet, shrugged it from his shoulders and threw it over the back of his chair. Then he rolled up his left sleeve, higher than Davos had had to, past his elbow to expose the stretch of skin just by the crook of his arm. He rubbed it with his other hand, as if uncharacteristically unsure, then turned it toward Davos.

Davos reached out. He brushed his fingers across it; as their skin touched, his own mark prickled. He felt himself smile. A number of things made a great deal more sense. 

"You didn't know," Stannis said. 

"Well, I couldn't read," Davos replied. 

"Yes," Stannis said. "I know. And when you chose _Seaworth_..." 

Stannis wrapped one hand around Davos' wrist. The prickle in his soulmark turned into a low and steady thrum and Davos understood; Stannis had known and hadn't said a word because he'd known Davos _didn't_ know. Because he, just as Davos did, knew that the world was hard and full of liars, though he strove toward the truth himself; he hadn't been sure he'd be believed. And, for once, his tone said he did not find this fact straightforward. 

Davos didn't stay that night, or the night after it, or any night at the tourney in King's Landing. He sat far from Stannis' table each night at dinner, glancing that way from time to time but otherwise apart, but then he slipped into the tent. They sat together, shoulder to shoulder, back of hand pressed to back of hand, barely a word because they didn't seem to need them. 

Back at Storm's End, though, Stannis took him into his chambers. Davos knew more about what they were doing than Stannis did, that much was obvious, but that didn't seem to matter; Davos showed him how to kiss him, mouth soft; he showed him how to open him up with his freshly oiled fingers and fuck him, slowly, breathlessly, as his soulmark throbbed all the way down to his cock. Stannis gasped, his usual composure tattered. When Davos kissed him, Stannis groaned, and came, his forehead pressed to Davos' collarbone. 

Six months ago, they returned from King's Landing. Since then, they've spent almost every night together. 

And now Davos doesn't have to wonder any longer. He knows precisely what his soulmark says, and he wonders if in some small way he always has.


End file.
